This topic is a big one for me. It is something that we discussed on the first episode of the Beyond Boss Podcast earlier this year, and something that I am constantly thinking about as a women that owns a business that is centered around collaboration. We are absolutely transitioning into a time where looking out for one another and being socially conscious is the “norm”, but this opens many of us up for really uncomfortable situations when a collaboration does not go as planned, or when we are approached for a collaboration that does not work for us or our brand.

This concept applies to both our professional and personal lives. From working relationships, to who is going to babysit your kids for Friday date night, collaboration is queen. Years of experience in business has left me burned a few times, and so earlier this year, when recording our podcast episode, Jess McGun and I came up with 4 steps for collaborating with your heart.

1. Look at the spectrum of relationships. Who are you collaborating with? Is this a stranger, acquaintance, colleague, friend, best friend, family, etc. It is so easy to get so excited about a project that you word vomit all of your thoughts, feelings, and ideas to someone, but it is so incredibly important for us to remember that all relationships fall on this spectrum, and it takes YEARS to build lasting, solid relationships. Not everyone is going to fit in what we called our “top 5″. The people that you would trust with your life, heart, and ideas.
   
   There is a huge difference between cultivating relationships and sharing all of your plans or thoughts. This applies in business and our personal lives.
   
   Search your heart to see where someone REALLY falls on that spectrum before sharing your heart and ideas with them. If you have a big heart, than chances are that you have been burned a time or two by thinking that everyone has your best interests at heart.
   
   Regularly review that “top 5”. Some relationships are here for seasons, not for life.
   
2. Do regular “heart checks”. Are you imagining ways that a project could benefit all involved? Whether it is my mama babysitting or a business collab, my goal is always to make sure that the relationship is mutually beneficial. Of course you want to make money or benefit in some way, but are you really taking the other parties interests to heart.
   
   Is this REALLY worth the time and effort? How will you proceed if things do not work out?
3. And when it doesn’t work out. Sometimes you check all the boxes and dive head on into a collaboration and it just does not work out. Maybe you are not being credited properly, you never got paid, someone took your ideas and used them as your own, or maybe you let someone down.
   
   The first thing to remember is that we cannot control other people’s intentions. Some people do not enter collaborations with the intent for it to be truly collaborative. Remember group projects? Sometimes your partner carried their share of the burden, and other times you did it all yourself. Sometimes your partner took all of the credit, sometimes you stood with the science fair award holding hands in the air.
   
   Did YOU do the heart check? Were YOUR intentions pure? You can be angry and hurt. Those feelings long term do not serve us. At some point we have to move on and know that we did what we could, and that not everyone is for us.
   
   What can you learn from that experience for your next collab?

You can have awesome, supportive collaborations with other women and still get things in writing, being clear about what the exchange is and what is expected, what is theirs afterwords, and how you should each be credited for the work.


The bottom line is that collaborating and sharing ideas is always a risk. Sometimes it ends up in a longterm, creative, incredible, mutually beneficial relationship, and sometimes it ends in stress and upset. Either way, learn something from it.

Enter things with pure intentions. That is the best place to start. You might screw things up, but keep at it.